


the devil's in the details

by gossamerthoughts



Series: invisible string [3]
Category: Lucifer (TV)
Genre: Established Chloe Decker/Lucifer Morningstar, F/M, Fluff, Love, One Shot, Post-Season/Series 05 Finale
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-06
Updated: 2020-09-06
Packaged: 2021-03-06 19:26:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,945
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26324116
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gossamerthoughts/pseuds/gossamerthoughts
Summary: Chloe contemplates why she needs to hear those three words from Lucifer so much.Season 5a finale spoilers!
Relationships: Chloe Decker & Lucifer Morningstar, Chloe Decker/Lucifer Morningstar
Series: invisible string [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1924108
Comments: 17
Kudos: 190





	the devil's in the details

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this on my phone right before falling asleep last night, so please excuse any typos hehe. I also may have binged the entire show (like... all 5 seasons) in the last 2 weeks so here we are.

Michael’s words have sunk under her skin, insidious snakes sliding in between her thoughts, black bile seeping through her veins. She knows this, knows Lucifer would die for her, knows he had quite literally gone to hell and back for her —  _ twice _ , apparently, though she would have to get the full story out of him some other time.

But she knows he cannot lie, and knows that he has as much as admitted she was — is — his first love. Even so, why is it so goddamn hard for him to say those three little words to her?

(She would maybe have to reconsider saying ‘God’ so much in Lucifer’s presence; now all his snipes about ‘dear old Dad’ make a hell lot more sense.)

It seems to be easier for him to jump in front of a blade or a bullet to save her life than to say “I love you.”

A part of her wonders if he’s capable of love, or if his messed up family situation has twisted him beyond repair. If his lifestyle of girls, guys, partying, and drugs has made him somehow desensitized to it all.

Quite simply: Chloe knows Lucifer better than she knows most people in her life, but he is and has always been an enigma. Even before the whole wow-he-really-is-the-Devil thing.

The silence in the little storage closet is deafening as she watches a strange range of emotions flicker across Lucifer’s face.

Has he... not realized he’d never explicitly told her “I love you”? Chloe can read people like those trashy romance novels she pretends not to like, and Lucifer looks genuinely confused, then shocked, by her tears and stuttering confession.

“Chloe,” he begins in that impossibly charming accent of his (Michael lost out on that one, Chloe thinks, though he clearly can fake it quite well). “Of course I lo-“

* * *

Something is off with the detective — Lucifer knows that much. Sure, he may not care about 99% of people other than himself, but the Detective has always been at the top of his Humans I Care About list.

He has his suspicions, of course. That bloody brother of his deserves more than a permanent scar across his face for kidnapping his detective. Lucifer can only begin to imagine the fears Michael’s drawn out of the detective, the words he’s twisted to kickstart Chloe’s brilliant brain. But Chloe is just that — bloody brilliant and intuitive and a purely good person, so Lucifer is confident that they’ll be okay.

99% confident.

But here they are, and Chloe is crying, and he’s realized in all his self-absorption that he has never said “I love you” to his beloved detective.

Truly, he’d thought that telling her she was his first love, that it’s  _ always _ been her, and subsequently literally going to Hell for millennia (for him) was enough, but hey. He’s never been a going steady kind of devil (what self respectable devil was?), so it’s all new and dandy to him.

How strange.

The words feel foreign in his mouth even as he knows he loves Chloe Decker with all of his devilish heart. As his mouth forms around them, it feels like molten lead is pouring down his throat — one of the demons’ favorite tortures.

The truth is… he, Lucifer Morningstar, didn’t remember a single instance in all his existence that he had said “I love you” to anyone.

Not to Mum — their relationship was complicated, even if he had sliced through the fabric of Earth for her — and  _ definitely _ not to dear old Dad.

But Chloe Decker is special, to say the least, and if anyone deserves the devil’s first “I love you,” it’s her.

She’s staring at him, frozen, and Lucifer wonders if his detective knows more than she’s letting on. Why else would it be so shocking that she quite literally can’t blink?

Oh. _Oh._

Bloody Amenadiel. Out of all the times for him to get it up again, this was not the time for his brother’s slowing time trick.

And then his sneaky, slimy, bloody infuriating meddling twin bursts in nearly cackling like a villain in a bad CW show and it’s really the last straw.

Nope, the last straw is when Maze has apparently backstabbed him again (though at least not literally this time) and stopped him from knocking his no-good twin out.

Wrong again. The real last straw is when dear old Dad decides to descend from Heaven and stop his children and a wayward demon from ripping each other apart in the LAPD precinct.

“You know I hate it when you fight, my children,” he says benevolently.

“Dad,” Lucifer gasps, a mixture of fear and disgust twisting his insides. Amenadiel looks contrite, guilty even, like he’s gotten caught with his hand in the cookie jar. Michael has literally stopped midpunch, gaping at their father like he’d just descended the heavens.

_Well, duh, Michael._ Clearly he hasn’t gotten any of the brains in the family.

“Father...” Amenadiel, the favorite child of God, speaks up first. Of course.

“Michael started it!” Lucifer bursts out. “As much as you hate me, Dad, you know I do not lie.”

Michael positively glares, his hunch more pronounced than ever. “Yes, poor little Samael, always the scapegoat, never in the wrong, are you?”

“Hmmm,” is all God says, and Lucifer finds himself thinking that really, Dad could’ve just stayed up there in Heaven all silent as usual if he’s not going to speak more than five words when down here.

“Michael, my son,” he says suddenly, and Michael’s ears and wings both perk up like a dog who’s been called. Typical.

“Samael’s been trying. I can see him changing — I  _ do _ watch over you, son, as much as you like to pretend I don’t,” he adds, throwing Lucifer a Very Godly Look. “And you, Michael, are not meant to sow chaos in this world. Hell needs a new guardian...”

All three angels gape at him, automatically filling in the blank. God smiles.

“But, Father —“ Michael starts.

“Always wanted to be me, Mikey. Now you finally can,” Lucifer sneers. “Have fun with the demons. Toodle loo.”

“Now, Lucifer. As much as I appreciate your willing return to Hell earlier, you have some stipulations for your stay here.” God turns to look at his prodigal son with a mixture of sadness and placidity.

“Don’t tell me — I have to be good etc etc etc. Oh, wait — must I stop telling people I’m the devil if Mikey boy there is going to be ruling Hell? He’s not ruling, right, just watching?”

Amenadiel is fighting the extreme urge to facepalm, but he has a feeling Father won’t approve. So he keeps his twitching fingers by his side. Maze sees and smirks.

God sighs. “Enough!” he bellows, and the remaining glass in the precinct shatters.

“Michael, you have two choices — an exile here on Earth or an exile in Hell. Not permanent, my son, but it is your punishment. Samael, your stipulations will become clear in the future. Amenadiel, I will allow your child to live here on Earth if that is what you wish. You know I don’t like to meddle…”

Lucifer scoffs at this. Dear old Dad was as much a meddler as he was a liar — which is to say, he was definitely both.

“So I will leave you to the consequences of your actions. But you must not fight again. I will not have another one of my children’s deaths after Uriel.”

All three quiet at the name of their fallen brother, heads bowed in sorrow.

“Yes, Father,” they chorus.

God smiles… and pauses.

From somewhere in the very still precinct, they hear a faint rustling.

* * *

She knows he’s serious about it when he calls her “Chloe” — Lucifer is a big fan of monikers, and Chloe supposes she’s grateful that he hasn’t settled on something as horrendous as “Detective Douche.” Poor Dan.

But when she blinks again, she’s alone in the room, and Lucifer is nowhere to be found.

Her breath catches in her throat, remembering all the times Lucifer has left her, has let her down, and all the times she’s let him back in. Because, despite everything, she loves him, flaws and all.

Would he rather run again than say he loves her?

Every hair on her body is standing up, her nerves on edge. Chloe Decker has made it this far as a detective by listening to her gut, and her instincts are screaming that something is very wrong.

She realizes what it is almost immediately — the stillness. There’s no chatter of rookie cops, no shuffling of papers, no steady drip of the coffeemaker. It’s almost apocalyptic, the eerie silence. And then a voice sounds, something that’s akin to molten gold, and she finds herself opening the door and walking toward it, zombie-like.

What she finds is almost enough to drop her to her knees. If she were anyone but Chloe Decker, apparent miracle from God, who has seen the Devil’s true face and not gone insane, who has seen real, true angel wings, that is.

There, standing on the very steps to the precinct where they bring in common criminals, is undoubtedly Lucifer’s ‘dear old Dad.’

God himself.

He’s enveloped in a heavenly golden glow, because of course. His eyes are dark and kind, and for a moment, Chloe feels like everything’s okay. But then she comes back to her senses, and she remembers all the shit Lucifer’s dad put him through, the physical and emotional scars that are still healing, remembers that he  _ put her on this very earth _ for Lucifer, which is sweet in a way but also deeply messed up.

_ We’re all pawns, _ she remembers Lucifer saying bitterly, features twisted with pain. Anger.

“What the hell is going on here?!” Chloe demands, glaring at the three angels, wings out, Maze, who’s clenching her knives desperately, and the Heavenly Father himself, looking bizarrely at ease in this very human setting.

“Ah, Chloe Decker,” God says, and Chloe feels light-headed.

_ It’s all true, _ her own voice echos in her mind, the same thing she blurted when she saw Lucifer’s devil face for the first time.

“Leave her alone,” Lucifer snarls, his wings twitching angrily.

“Why me?” she says, ignoring her angelic/demonic boyfriend for the time being.

“Because you, my child, are destined to be special. Now, I must be going…”

And with that, God leaves in a blinding flash of light.

“Of course he leaves us with no answers, Dad-damn it,” Lucifer scoffs.

“Now, Luci…” Amenadiel reprimands, looking a little at awe.  _ Godstruck,  _ Chloe thinks.

Both Lucifer and Amenadiel round on their brother, who now has his hands up in surrender. “I’m sorry?” Michael offers.

“Don’t move,” Lucifer growls. “I have something important to do. You know, before the lot of you so rudely interrupted me.”

And he turns toward Chloe, his eyes dark and earnest, his beautiful white wings still fluttering in the middle of the frozen precinct. “Detective. _Chloe_. I love you. I always have, and always will.”

The words come out without a stutter, without pause, and Chloe finds herself falling into his arms, both from the words and from everything that’s happened that day. His wings wrap around her comfortingly, and she gets the strangest feeling that she’s felt his wings sheltering her before.

Before she can think twice about it, his head dips down and his lips find hers in a searing kiss. As they break apart, he wipes a stray tear from her cheek with a soft thumb. “I love you too, Lucifer,” she says, smiling.

Lucifer thinks it’s the most angelic thing he’s ever seen.


End file.
